EU integration and party politics in the Balkans E P C I S S U E P A P E R N

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EU integration and party politics in the Balkans

E P C I S S U E P A P E R NO. 7 7 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 4

Edited by Corina Stratulat

EUROPEAN POLITICS AND INSTITUTIONS

ISSN 1782-494X PROGRAMME

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The EPC’s Programme on European Politics and Institutions

With the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, the new focus of this programme is on adapting the EU’s institutional architecture to take account of the changed set-up and on bringing the EU closer to its citizens.

Continuing discussion on governance and policymaking in Brussels is essential to ensure that the European project can move forward and respond to the challenges facing the Union in the 21^st century in a democratic and effective manner.

This debate is closely linked to the key questions of how to involve European citizens in the discussions over its future; how to win their support for European integration and what are the prospects for, and consequences of, further enlargement towards the Balkans and Turkey.

This programme focuses on these core themes and brings together all the strands of the debate on a number of key issues, addressing them through various fora, task forces and projects. It also works with other programmes on cross-cutting issues such as the reform of European economic governance or the new EU foreign policy structures.

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About the authors

Igor BANDOVIĆ is Senior Programme Manager for the European Fund for the Balkans (EFB) where he has been working since 2008. He is in charge of the Think and Link capacity-building programme for the emerging think tanks in the Balkan region, as well as the supporting policy-development initiatives and projects within the EFB. He coordinated the Gallup Balkan Monitor, a regional public opinion survey which was conducted through partnership with Gallup Europe (2009-2011). Before joining EFB, he worked for the UNDP Serbia team. From 2002 to 2006, he worked for the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights. He has researched and published on many topics, including the role of civil society and human and minority rights in Serbia and the Balkans.

Odeta BARBULLUSHI is full time Lecturer of International relations and Vice-Rector for Research and Methodology at the European University of Tirana, and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Roehampton, London. She received her PhD from the University of Birmingham, Centre for Russian and East European Studies. Her research interests include nationalism and state formation in Southeast Europe, the role of the EU and other external actors in the Balkans, critical security studies and post-structuralism in International Relations.

Simonida KACARSKA is a research coordinator at the European Policy Institute in Skopje, Macedonia. She holds a PhD in Politics and International Studies from the University of Leeds in the UK. She was a research fellow at the Central European University, University of Oxford and the University of Edinburgh project The Europeanisation of Citizenship in the Successor States of the Former Yugoslavia. She has both practitioner and research experience related to the political transformation and European integration of the Balkans. She has published in a number of international academic journals and is the author of a several working and policy papers.

Andrew KONITZER (PhD, Political Science, University of Pittsburgh) is Associate Director of the Center for Russian and East European Studies and Adjunct Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. He specialises in electoral institutions, party politics, voting behaviour, European Union enlargement and issues of democratic decentralisation in the Balkans and the Former Soviet Union. His publications include the book Voting for Russia's Governors: Regional Elections and Accountability under Yeltsin and Putin (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006) and articles in journals such as Europe-Asia Studies, East European Politics and Societies, Electoral Studies, Post-Soviet Affairs and Publius: The Journal of Federalism.

Jovana MAROVIĆ has been working since 2008 as Researcher coordinator for Institute Alternative, a Podgorica-based think tank. Previously, she has also been a counselor for European integration in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Municipality of Budva. She holds a PhD from the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade and has successfully completed several specialised diplomatic programmes, including the Diplomatic Academy. Since March 2012 she is a member of the working group for Chapter 23-Judiciary and fundamental rights, in the processes of Montenegro’s EU accession negotiations.

Marko SOŠIĆ is Researcher at Institute Alternative, a Podgorica-based think tank. His primary areas of interest include the control function of the parliament and integrity of public finance. He has authored numerous policy papers on these and other topics. In 2013, he was appointed by the government as member of the working group for the preparation of Montenegro’s accession negotiations on Chapter 32-Financial control.

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Corina STRATULAT is Senior Policy Analyst at the European Policy Centre where she works on issues related to EU enlargement to the Balkans and EU institutional developments. Her research interests include comparative Central and East European politics, elections, democracy, EU institutions, integration and enlargement policy. She holds a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Integrated Social Sciences from Jacobs University (Bremen, Germany), a Master of Philosophy (MPhil) in Contemporary European Studies from Cambridge University (Cambridge, UK) and a Doctorate (PhD) in Political and Social Sciences from European University Institute (Florence, Italy).

Marko VUJAČIĆ is Senior Researcher at the European Research Academy Belgrade (EURAK). He is a PhD candidate at the Karl-Franzens University of Graz-Faculty of Law, in the Joint PhD Programme of Diversity Management and Governance, with a research focus on federalism. He holds a degree in International Affairs from University of Belgrade (Serbia), a Master of Arts in Human Rights from the Central European University (Hungary) and a Master in European Studies from the University of Bonn (Germany). He is member of the Federal Committee of the Union of European Federalists (UEF) and, since 2009, the President of the Serbian UEF branch.

Bodo WEBER is Senior Associate of the Democratization Policy Council (DPC) concentrating on the Balkans region. He is a longtime analyst of international policy, Balkans politics and society, German foreign policy. He has worked as editor of the journal Perspektiven (Frankfurt/Main) and as board member of the Bosnien-Büro Frankfurt. He has published extensively on politics in the Balkans, post- conflict peacebuilding, democratisation and German foreign policy, and is a regular commentator on these topics in the main Southeast European media. He holds a MA in political science and Eastern European history from the Johann-Wolfgang-Goethe-University in Frankfurt/Main.

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List of tables

_2.1 Key dates in Croatia’s integration effort 17

2.2 Post-2000 coalition governments in Croatia 18 2.3 Support for Croatia’s accession to the EU (2000-2011) 22

3.1 The Montenegrin governments since 1991 32

3.2 Voter turnout in Montenegrin elections since the 1990s 33 3.3 Composition of current Montenegrin parliament 34 3.4 Public support for EU integration in Montenegro 36 3.5 Public trust in political parties in Montenegro (2009-2013) 42

4.1 Serbia’s milestones on the EU path 50

4.2 Presidents, Prime Ministers and coalition governments in Serbia 51 4.3 Public support for Serbia’s membership in the European Union 62

5.1 Governing coalitions 72

5.2 Ethnic differences in support for Euro-Atlantic integration 81 6.1 Results of Albanian parliamentary elections in 2009 and 2013 89 6.2 Public support for EU membership in Albania 93

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Foreword

The results of the European Parliament’s elections of May 2014 were

another reminder of the importance of political parties as a lynchpin between citizens, and their representative institutions and governments.

They were also yet another ringing bell of the growing distance between the former and the latter. There is a somewhat bitter irony in the EU’s history: it has been a unique international example of external anchor and promoter of domestic democratisation processes, yet seems incapable of fostering healthy democratic practices and attachments within. It has become commonplace to claim that enlargement has been the most successful EU policy, also thanks to its transformative impact on democratising countries. Yet it is also in these countries which recently benefited from the EU’s transformational pull – and not just in the tired European democracies – that discontent or lack of interest in European politics has become apparent, with record low turnout for elections and backlashes in various countries, while in many member states, old and new, ‘anti-‘ parties are on the rise.

At its heart, the trouble with democracy is the underlying question of this collected volume. The way in which it develops this question is particularly enlightening for readers interested in political parties, democracy and its weaknesses, EU enlargement, populism, and the Balkan countries. Drawing from the history of democracy and democratisation, and from experiences in Central and Eastern Europe through the accession process and membership since 2004, this paper examines the development of political parties and dynamics in the Balkan states. The thoroughly researched and well-argued chapters draw out the postwar and state-building specificities of the region, while identifying similarities with the rest of Europe as a whole, and with the accession process of the Central and Eastern European states.

In doing so, it sheds light on key issues pertaining to the current accession process, arguing that the EU policy should address more overtly the role of political parties as key protagonists of historical change.

Rosa Balfour Director of Europe in the World Programme

at the European Policy Centre

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Executive summary

Democracy has become the lingua franca of the European Union’s enlargement to the Balkans. The notions of free and fair elections, robust rule of law, effective public administration, healthy civil society, and free media are by now the distinctive features of that vocabulary, which has expanded with every previous round of EU widening. Yet for all the eloquence of democratic words exchanged for more than a decade by the Union and the countries of the region, the eloquence of democratic action in the Balkans still seems inadequate.

Throughout the region, popularly elected leaders consistently fail to meet the democratic standards set by the EU and, more importantly, they fall short of their voters’

expectations. Distrust in representative institutions and disengagement from political life runs dramatically high among the people of the Balkan countries, and this generalised sense of dissatisfaction is starting to breed cynicism also towards the idea of a better future inside the Union.

But if Balkan governments are the common source of disappointment both for the EU and the electorates in the region, and if political parties are not mere appendages but the very backbone of democratic government, to what extent is the Union’s democratic agenda in the Balkans concerned with the condition of political parties?

The five country case studies included in this paper suggest that the issue of political party development and interaction in the Balkans is not systematically addressed by the democratic conditionality for accession. The EU meddles in inter-party relations and party links to society in the aspiring countries of the region but it does so mostly in reaction to specific problems, largely indirectly through the interpretation of conditions by domestic actors, and not always with long-term positive consequences.

Whether it pits insiders against outsiders in a party system, whether it makes or breaks governing coalitions, and whether it fosters the (de)politicisation of policymaking, this study shows that the interplay between EU integration and national politics in the region is both consequential for the quality of Balkan democracies, as well as reminiscent of the Western and Central and Eastern European experience.

To guarantee lasting peace and the sustainability of the democratic transformation in the Balkans, the EU should get interested in party politics in the Balkans. The European Commission should devise and treat well thought through standards of democratic performance of political parties and party systems as any other formal accession requirements. More attention and support should also be given to boosting political party activism and citizen’s engagement with political life in the Balkan countries.

Given the similar ways in which the EU integration process impacts political party dynamics in the member states and the aspiring Balkan countries, investing in finding solutions to common worrying trends – such as the party-society gap or political party monopolies – is a sensible course of action not only for the sake of the Balkan polities but also for the future of European democracy.

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Abbreviations

BH BiH CEE CEFTA CSOs DOS DPA DPA DPS DF DS DSS DUI EP EU EULEX EUPM Fidesz FKGP FYROM GSS HDZ HDZ BiH HLAD HNS HSLS HSP HSS HZDS ICJ ICTY IDS IMF IPA JHA LDP MP MEP NATO NCEI NGOs NLA NOVA ODIHR OECD OFA OHR OSCE

Bosniak Party for Bosnia-Herzegovina Bosnia and Herzegovina

Central and Eastern Europe

Central European Free Trade Agreement Civil society organisations

Democratic Opposition of Serbia Democratic Party of Albanians Dayton Peace Agreement Democratic Party of Socialists Democratic Front

Democratic Party

Democratic Party of Serbia Democratic Union of Integration European Parliament

European Union

European Union Rule of Law Mission

European Union Police Mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina Hungarian Federation of Young Democrats

Hungarian Smallholders’ Party

former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia Civic Alliance of Serbia

Croatian Democratic Union Croatian Democratic Community High Level Accession Dialogue Croatian People’s Party Croatian Social Liberal Party Croatian Party of Rights Croatian Peasant Party

Movement for a Democratic Slovakia International Court of Justice

International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia Istrian Democratic Party

International Monetary Fund

Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance Justice and Home Affairs

Liberal Democratic Party member of parliament

member of the European parliament North Atlantic Treaty Organisation National Council for EU Integration Non-governmental organisations National Liberation Front New Serb Democracy

Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Ohrid Framework Agreement

Office of the High Representative

Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe

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OSFA PDP PIC PzP RCC RLI SAA SAP SCG SDA SDP SDP BiH SDS SDSM SDSS SIGMA SNSD SNP SNS SP SPO SPS SR SRS UNHCR URS VMRO-DPMNE

Open Society Foundation for Albania Party for Democratic Prosperity Peace Implementation Council Movement for Changes Regional Cooperation Council Rule of Law Index

Stabilisation and Association Agreement Stabilisation and Association Process Union of Serbia and Montenegro Party of Democratic Action Social Democratic Party

Social Democratic Party of Bosnia-Herzegovina Serbian Democratic Party

Socialist Democratic Union of Macedonia Independent Democratic Serb Party

Support for Improvement in Governance and Management Alliance of Independent Social Democrats

Socialist People’s Party Serbian Progressive Party Stability Pact

Serbian Renewal Movement Socialist Party of Serbia Republika Srpska Serbian Radical Party

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees United Regions of Serbia

Internal Democratic Revolutionary Organisation – Democratic Party for Macedonian National Unity

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INTRODUCTION

BY CORINA STRATULAT

1.1 EU integration, democracy and party politics 2

1.2 The Balkans in comparative perspective 4

1.3 Lessons from the ‘West’ and ‘East’ 7

Imagine a situation in which a referendum is organised in an autonomous republic – let us call it Crimea – on the right of self-determination among its citizens, and that turnout is 83% and the result 97% in support of one of the options put to vote. The apparent democratic credentials of such a mass plebiscite, giving clear expression to the seemingly resolute will of the people, would per se be hard to write off. But suppose that the referendum was invoked by a parliament set up at gunpoint and run by a party that won a whole of 4% in the latest general elections; that the campaign was a shameless propaganda by a puppet local government which cracked down on any type of opposition;

and that the vote took place under foreign occupation of most of Crimea’s territory and strategic facilities. In that case, the smokescreen of legitimacy for the exercise would surely be shattered, exposing blatant abuse of first-order democratic tools and basic freedoms.

Crimea is arguably an extreme example in what is otherwise an increasingly common phenomenon, especially among Third Wave democracies: multiparty elections as well as other institutional arrangements “for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide”¹ are made use of by phony democratic leaders in order to wrap in the mantle of legitimacy restrictions on rights and liberties, the rule of law or the separation of state powers. In other words, democracy might have become “the only game in town”² in many places around the globe but there is pronounced variation in the way it is ‘played’ in practice, with many countries flaunting the ‘democracy’ label while pursuing goals incompatible with that badge of honour. Precisely for that reason, Fareed Zakaria insists that “[a]s we approach the next century, our task is to make democracy safe for the world.”³

Zakaria’s message rings particularly true for the European Union, which ever since the fall of communism in the early 1990s has assumed a key role in supporting, such as via (pre-)/accession strategies, the democratic transitions of its immediate neighbours, including the current EU-hopeful

1 Schumpeter, Joseph A. (1947), Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, London and New York: Routledge, p. 269.

2 Linz, Juan J. and Stepan, Alfred (1996), Problems of democratic transition and consolidation: Southern Europe, South America and post-communist Europe, Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, p. 5, based on a phrase from Giuseppe de Palma.

3 Zakaria, Fareed (1997), “The rise of illiberal democracy”, Foreign Affairs, Volume 76, Number 6, pp. 22-43, quote from p. 43.

Chapter

1

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countries in the Balkans.⁴ By making the promise of membership strictly conditional upon the adoption of a broad array of norms, practices and far-reaching reforms, the EU is said to have found the most effective means of projecting democracy beyond its borders.⁵ And so, still today, the EU dangles the ‘carrot’ of accession in the hope of completing the democratic transformation and modernisation of politics, institutions and economies in the latest aspiring countries, which come from the Balkan region.

But does enlargement and democratisation necessarily go hand in hand? What kind of democracy does the EU promote and seek to consolidate in the Balkans? Has the introduction of free and fair elections produced a government for the people in the region? To what extent is the Union concerned with political party development and party system dynamics in the Balkans? How has the EU defined the standards of behaviour for elected regimes in the Balkan countries to judge the democratic quality of their political systems? Which issues and lessons learned have inspired the EU’s approach to the democratisation of the region? And will these suffice to ensure that the Balkan countries do not fall back on their democratic achievements or undermine the Union from within, once they become member states?

1.1 EU INTEGRATION, DEMOCRACY AND PARTY POLITICS

The model of democracy promotion through integration was developed in preparation for the EU’s expansion towards the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries and defines now also the Union’s engagement with the Balkan aspirants. However, already in the case of the 2004 and 2007 rounds of enlargement, the effects of the integration process on the CEE democratic transitions proved complex – and not unequivocally positive.

The externally driven and non-negotiable conditionality for EU accession strengthened central executives (as the main interlocutors of the European Commission) at the expense of national parliaments, and stifled debate over competing reform options in the CEE countries. As a result, people lost trust in their political leaders – perceived as corrupt and self-interested – and developed increasingly contentious appreciations about the process of European integration, which seemed to allow voters to “change governments far more easily than […] policies.”⁶ Hence the paradox: while enlargement led to the development of CEE democratic institutions, it simultaneously weakened a central tenet of democratic societies – the ability of voters to influence how they are governed – rocking the concept of political representation to its very core.

The growing incapacity of political parties to give voice to their electorates has not only reduced the ability of parties to engage the ordinary citizen with conventional party politics but it has also exposed parties to the constant challenge of legitimising their governance and of handling populist outbidding. The democratic backlash⁷ witnessed in countries like Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, and Romania shortly after their EU entry was to a large extent fuelled by this technocratic ascendance and consensual politics of the integration period, and offered clues

4 That includes: Montenegro, Serbia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and, before 1 July 2013, when it acceded to the EU, also Croatia.

5 Dimitrova, Antoaneta and Pridham, Geoffrey (2004), “International actors and democracy promotion in Central and Eastern Europe: the integration model and its limits”, Democratization, Volume 11, Number 5, pp. 91-112. See also, Lavenex, Sandra and Schimmelfennig, Frank (2011), “EU democracy promotion in the neighbourhood: from leverage to governance?”, Democratization, Volume 18, Number 4, pp. 885-909.

6 Krastev, Ivan (2002), “The Balkans: democracy without choices”, Journal of Democracy, Volume 13, Number 3, pp. 39-53.

7 See the 2007 special edition, “Is East-Central Europe Backsliding?”, of the Journal of Democracy, Volume 18, Number 4, which is dedicated to this topic.

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about the ways in which the EU’s democratic transformation of the region had been merely skin- deep and even reversible.

To be sure, elsewhere in the EU, among the long-standing democracies of the member states, similar trends are also ever more obvious. As Mair puts it, “[n]ever in the history of postwar Europe have governments and their political leaders – at the national level – been held in such low regard.”⁸ And since much of what governments do nowadays is linked to ‘Europe’ (that is, negotiating, transposing and implementing EU decisions), mobilisation against political elites often takes on a Eurosceptic hue. This feeds into the already unprecedentedly negative public opinion about the process and products of European integration revealed, for instance, by Eurobarometer polls. But it contributes also to the growing popularity in many different member states of political parties with a strong populist and Eurosceptic rhetoric, demonstrated most recently by the success of the “anti” parties in the 2014 elections to the European Parliament.

The fact that Euroscepticism and cynicism about politics are related shows how the interplay between the EU and national political arenas can have knock-on effects on democracy and the future of the European project. If, according to Schattschneider, “political parties created democracy and […] modern democracy is unthinkable save in terms of political parties”⁹, then the view that national politicians are failing in their representative role prompts a rethink of what democracy entails.

Likewise, if the EU and national levels of governance are by now difficult to separate and closely tied up with one another – both in the member states and the aspiring countries – then deficiencies in the functioning of European democracies cannot be understood unless they are seen in the context of wider problems with the Union’s integration strategies.

The Balkan countries supply an ideal testing ground for the EU’s approach to democratisation, and, more specifically, to political parties as markers of democratic government. For as long as a democratic acquis is still lacking inside the Union, the political conditionality to which all the applicant countries in the region are subjected provides the clearest definition available of what ‘Europe’ understands by democracy. And the condition of political parties – as shaped by the integration process and the dynamics of the domestic party system – supplies the best possible evidence of the nature of specific political regimes in the Balkan countries.¹⁰

Already the signs throughout the region are not exactly heartening: dramatically low levels of trust in political parties and other national democratic institutions; a gradual popular withdrawal from conventional politics (such as falling electoral participation, depleted party membership rates and scarce party-related activism); a subtle concentration of political power in a few hands and away from any viable political alternative/opposition; and a sharp polarisation among the main political actors.

Moreover, if such trends seem by now at home in the Balkans it may not be so much in spite but precisely because of the European integration process, which has exported them from the Union to the region. Much like in the EU, this could herald the onset of the crisis of representation in the Balkans, with its immediate fall-outs: a widening gap between citizens and their political leaders as well as a surge in rhetorical and actual political protest by frustrated citizens and populist parties.

But at least any potential procedural or conceptual shortcomings identified in the EU’s democratisation efforts still stand a chance to be remedied in the case of the Balkans, given that the Union’s leverage is unlikely to vanish until these countries become fully-fledged members. And the manner and extent to

8 Mair, Peter (2006), “Polity-scepticism, party failings and the challenge to European democracy”, Uhlenbeck Lecture 24, Wassenaar: Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study.

9 Schattschneider, Elmer Eric (1942), Party government: American government in action, New York: Rinehart and Co., p. 1.

10 Ibid. See also, Ladrech, Robert (2001), “Europeanisation and political parties: towards a framework for analysis”, Working Paper No. 7, Keele European Parties Research Unit (KEPRU); Sitter (2002), op. cit.

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which the EU integration agenda finds expression in different national contexts and alters the parameters of party politics in the Balkans can offer insights into the ability and willingness of the countries in the region to undertake sustainable democratic reforms and bring a positive contribution to the European project, post-accession.

1.2 THE BALKANS IN COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE

With some ten difficult years down the road of wholesale economic, political and societal transformation – precipitated by the aim to join the EU – the Balkan countries have their own story to tell about the “domestication of Europe”¹¹, as seen through the prism of their national political parties and party systems. The next chapters of this paper will cover in some detail the experience of six countries in the region, namely: Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), Albania, and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

This is not to suggest that the Balkan narrative on European integration would be qualitatively different from that in the member states or the CEE countries. If anything, there are reasons to expect that political life in relation to the EU should be broadly comparable, and so considerations that were found relevant in Western and East-Central Europe are expected to apply also in the Balkans. This comparative framework is deemed suitable especially given that Balkan political parties are not unlike their EU counterparts in terms of the basic goals that induce their behaviour:

maximising votes, gaining office and shaping policy.¹² Moreover, across these regions, political parties remain the main agents of the EU, as well as the protagonists of the integration project both in Brussels (where they negotiate or vote on policies in their capacity of national representatives) and at ‘home’ (where they prepare the membership bid and/or implement EU policies/decisions in government or opposition).

Clearly, a number of elements in the ‘strategic environment’ of the Balkan political parties set the region apart. For instance, the Balkans might share with Central and Eastern Europe the experience of democratic regime-building and consolidation, while in the West, European integration arrived only after the full democratisation of most countries, when, for example, party systems were fairly well- established.¹³ However, the need to rebuild postwar institutions and societies, and to resolve complex statehood issues, gives a unique character to the democratisation of the Balkans. This could make the Balkan aspirants worse equipped than their CEE predecessors to deal with the conditionality for accession. But it might also provide Balkan political entrepreneurs with opportunities to put a novel spin on EU integration, engaging in new debates and policy areas, and advocating issues hitherto underrepresented or absent in the politics of the member states/CEE countries.

Moreover, the ‘hurdle’ of accession for the Balkan countries – especially the political dimension of the conditionality – has become far greater, making their access into the European ‘club’ progressively more difficult to secure. As in previous rounds of enlargement, the essence of the political conditions is

11 Wallace, Helen (1999), “Whose Europe is it anyway? The 1998 Stein Rokkan lecture”, European Journal of Political Research, Volume 35, Number 3, pp. 287-306.

12 See, for instance, Batory, Agnes (2002), “Attitudes to Europe: a comparative politics approach to the issue of European Union membership in Hungarian party politics”, PhD Thesis, Centre of International Studies, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press and Sitter Nick (2002), “Opposing Europe: Euroscepticism, opposition, and party competition”, Opposing Europe Research Network, Working Paper No. 9, Sussex European Institute, both of whom draw on Downs, Anthony (1957), An economic theory of democracy, New York: Harper and Row; and Sartori, Giovanni (1976), Parties and party systems: a framework for analysis, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

13 Henderson, Karen (2002), “Exceptionalism or convergence? Euroscepticism and party systems in Central and Eastern Europe”, Paper presented to ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops, Turin, p. 4.

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captured in the Copenhagen criteria¹⁴, which require any aspirant country to achieve stable institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights, and respect for and protection of minorities.

However, in practice, this has acquired a very precise and detailed meaning for the Balkans.

In 2011, a novel and more rigorous approach was proposed by the European Commission¹⁵, and endorsed by the Council, building mostly on lessons from the Union’s eastward expansions. In a nutshell, aspiring countries must now get a head start on rule of law reforms, develop a solid track record of results and adopt inclusive democratic processes (accommodating parliaments, civil society and other relevant stakeholders) to support their national European integration effort.

The EU’s increased focus on ‘good governance’ criteria (such as maintenance of rule of law, independent judiciary, efficient public administration, the fight against organised crime and corruption, civil society development, and media freedom) was visible already during Croatia’s accession. Yet the new strategy was for the first time reflected in a formal manner in the framework adopted in June 2012 for negotiations with Montenegro, which foresees that Chapter 23 (on Judiciary and Fundamental Rights) and Chapter 24 (on Justice, Freedom and Security) are opened in the early stages of the talks and closed only at the very end of the process. The same approach was then fully integrated in the EU’s negotiations with Serbia, which kicked-off in January 2014, and will continue to be observed in all future accession talks with the remaining countries in the Balkans.

Moreover, the heavy weight of rule of law issues can be felt now also before the actual negotiations, as was amply demonstrated, for example, by the key priorities set out in past years with a view to allowing Montenegro and Albania to advance on their respective EU paths.¹⁶

Equally important, the method for applying this enhanced political conditionality has become more exacting, by tying any steps forward more strictly to implementation. New mechanisms were introduced, for instance: opening, intermediary, equilibrium, and closing benchmarks; safeguard clauses to extend monitoring; more routine procedures to suspend negotiations; early screening processes; and the requirement for countries to demonstrate that they are actually able to put into effect the policies adopted.

By October 2013, in its latest enlargement strategy, the Commission’s motto read: “fundamentals first”, making direct reference to the fact that “[d]emocracy is more than the conduct of free and fair elections. It is about strong, accountable institutions and participatory processes”¹⁷ that can secure the rule of law principle on which the EU is founded. The importance of strengthening national parliaments, public administrations, courts, and enforcement agencies, as well as of fostering a culture of consensus across parties and the wider society were firmly anchored at the top of the Union’s ‘to-do’ list for the Balkans.

14 These were formulated by the European Council in 1992 and also demand of any EU aspirant country a functioning market economy and the capacity to cope with competitive and market forces in the EU, as well as the ability to assume and implement into domestic legislation the obligations of membership, that is the acquis communautaire. The EU's capacity to absorb new members while maintaining the momentum of integration is further mentioned as an important consideration.

15 Enlargement strategy and main challenges 2011-2012, Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council, COM(2011) 666 final, Brussels, 12 October 2011.

16 For example, in December 2011, the European Council indicated that Montenegro will receive the green light to open accession talks with the EU if it produces results in the fight against corruption and organised crime and in October 2012, the Commission recommended that Albania be granted candidate status if it adopts key measures in the areas of judicial and public administration reform and if it revises its parliamentary rules of procedures.

17 Enlargement strategy and main challenges 2013-2014, Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council, COM 2013) 700 final, Brussels, 16 October 2013, quotes from pp. 2, 8.

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To help the countries of the region meet these ambitious democratic targets, the EU has set forth pre-accession packages¹⁸ and works closely with European agencies like the Europol, Eurojust and Frontex, as well as with international organisations such as the Council of Europe (including the Venice Commission), the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe/Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE/ODIHR) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development/Support for Improvement in Governance and Management (OECD/SIGMA). In addition, the transnational links established between major Balkan political parties and European parties/party groups in the European Parliament seek to assist party development and ideological structuring in the region.

Furthermore, in response to security concerns and enduring war legacies in the Balkans, the Union has devised unparalleled and politically-sensitive conditions to be fulfilled by the countries of the region before accession, when the EU has learned that its leverage was most robust. Chief among those are the requirement of full cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), regional cooperation and reconciliation, the resolution of bi-lateral standoffs (such as between Greece and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia over the name issue) or of statehood (most notably for Serbia and Kosovo), and refugee return.

And apart from the fact that the bar for accession has been raised high for the Balkan aspirants, the member states also seem to favour now a much more hands-on approach to the process than in previous rounds. Compared to the past, the frequency of instances in which the member states interfere to block or delay decisions in the Council appears to have increased, including in relation to early milestones on the EU track (for instance, granting candidate status to a country). Moreover, especially in the context of the ongoing crisis, such incursions often tend to be motivated by domestic politics in the member states rather than by assessments of the situation in the region according to the European Commission.¹⁹ This tendency to depart from agreed standards and procedures bestows an unpredictable and protracted nature on the current enlargement and could generate frustration, and nurture friction and opposition on the part of domestic actors in the Balkans, possibly more so than was the case for the CEE countries.

Undoubtedly, differences exist also within the Balkan region as a whole, if one distinguishes for instance, between countries: small or big (such as Montenegro versus Serbia), ethnically diverse or homogeneous (like Bosnia-Herzegovina versus Albania), Catholic or Orthodox or Muslim (for instance, Croatia versus Serbia versus Albanians throughout the region), with a harsher or milder communist past (that is, Albania versus the ex-Yugoslav republics), with or without war legacies (such as Croatia/Serbia/Bosnia-Herzegovina versus Albania/Montenegro/the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia), and with agreed or contested borders (for example, Montenegro versus Serbia-Kosovo).

Such dissimilarities could translate in each case into catalysts or tall obstacles for the region’s common task of democratic consolidation and EU accession.

18 Including, for instance, substantial financial commitments made under its Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance (IPA) – which between 2007-2013 provided over 30 million euro to capacity building of national parliamentary assemblies, ombudsmen and national audit institutions, and almost 190 million euro to support civil society organisations – and which was launched for a second time (IPA II) in 2014, with funds of 11.7 billion earmarked inter alia for the consolidation of democratic institutions and the development of the civil society sector.

19 Rosa, Balfour and Corina, Stratulat (2013), “Between engagement and cold feet: ten years of the EU in the Western Balkans”, in Prifti, Eviola (ed.), The European future of the Western Balkans: Thessaloniki @ 10, Paris: European Union Institute for Security Study, pp. 19-25. See also, Hillion, Christophe (2010), “The creeping nationalisation of the enlargement process”, SIEPS Paper, Stockholm: November. The EPC is currently running a project that investigates the nature and potential implications of member states’ interference in the process of EU enlargement to the Balkans.

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Moreover, the Balkan countries are at different stages of integration with the EU, ranging from the frontrunner Croatia, which has completed the accession negotiations in 2011 and became the 28^th member state on 1 July 2013, to Kosovo²⁰, which is now starting to institutionalise relations with the EU but has the membership prospects derailed by its unresolved statehood. In-between are Montenegro, which began its accession talks with the EU in 2012, and Serbia, which started negotiations in January 2014; the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), which was granted candidate status in 2005 but has not yet opened its EU talks; Albania, which only just became a candidate country in June 2014; and Bosnia-Herzegovina, which has a Stabilisation and Association Agreement with the EU but is still not in a position to apply for membership.

By the same token, the Balkan countries differ with regard to how well they function in democratic terms. According to the Freedom House (2012), Croatia, Serbia, former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Montenegro are ‘semi-consolidated democracies’, Albania and Bosnia-Herzegovina are ‘transitional governments’ or ‘hybrid regimes’, and Kosovo is a ‘semi-consolidated authoritarian regime’. Likewise, the Bertelsmann Stiftung Transformation Index (2012) indicates that only Croatia and Serbia qualify as ‘democracies in consolidation’, whereas the other Balkan countries may be collectively described as ‘defective democracies’: they hold relatively free elections but do not adequately ensure political and civil rights or the effective separation of state powers.²¹ Finally, while formal democracy (verified by the adoption of civil and political rights) is more or less in place throughout the region (with Croatia, Montenegro and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia ahead of Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina), effective democracy (certified by a robust rule of law to enforce existing constitutional rules and procedures) is still deficient, to various extents across the different Balkan countries.²²

Diversity – both in terms of European integration and democratisation – might have implications for the scope and degree of EU impact in individual countries, as the section below explains. Overall, however, these elements of divergence do not cancel out the possibility of attempting to compare across the region, as well as across the West, Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans, in order to see whether and how the experiences of individual Balkan countries fit with each other and in the wider EU context. Adopting a broadly comparative perspective might also help to settle the issue of

‘Balkan particularism’ and to reveal negative trends or examples of best practice in the EU’s approach to democratic conditionality. The final chapter of this paper returns to these ideas with some concrete answers and recommendations.

1.3 LESSONS FROM THE ‘WEST’ AND ‘EAST’

What is known about the interplay between national party politics and European integration is based on the experience of ‘old’ and ‘young’ member states, on which the bulk of the literature has focused. The intention here is not to provide an exhaustive review of the findings on the topic but rather to lay out four general observations documented and verified in previous analyses of Western and Central and Eastern European countries about the manner in which European integration is mediated by and affects national parties/party systems. These broad-brush arguments will be

20 Under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244.

21 Rosa, Balfour and Stratulat, Corina (2013), “Democratising the Western Balkans: where does the region stand?” in Prifti (2013), op. cit., pp. 27-33, especially pp. 28-30. See also, Diamond, Larry (2002), “Thinking about hybrid regimes”, Journal of Democracy, Volume 13, Number 2, pp. 21-35; O’Donnell, Guillermo (2004), “Why rule of law matters”, Journal of Democracy, Volume 15, Number 1, pp. 5-19, and Merkel, Wolfgang (2004), “Embedded and effective democracies”, Democratization, Volume 11, Number 5, pp. 33-58.

22 See Rosa Balfour and Stratulat, Corina (2009), “The democratic transformation of the Balkans”, EPC Issue Paper, No. 66, Brussels: European Policy Centre, especially pp. 5-6.

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discussed in the subsequent chapters for each of the Balkan countries included in this paper. They are simply meant to offer a common starting line for the analysis, without excluding the possibility that some of these might not be pertinent, while other new factors/aspects could emerge relevant in the Balkan context. The final chapter will bring together the conclusions of all the case studies covered, and reflect on them by reference to the experience of their EU neighbours.

1. Research suggests that a party’s position in the political system has a strong bearing on its European attitude in that mainstream political parties may have fewer incentives to politicise EU integration than parties at the periphery.²³

On the one hand, this suggests that political parties holding or seeking executive power tend to “play down the differences between them on [the European] dimension”²⁴ and to “collude”²⁵ on ‘Europe’

by adopting a broad, technocratic pro-EU position, which is rarely emphasised in electoral competition. If picked up in election campaigns, ‘Europe’ is usually debated as a ‘valance issue’:

parties agree that it is a matter of shared interest and argue over whom is most competent to represent it. This argument does not preclude opposition to further integration or to specific policy areas/developments, when there is a sense that ‘national interest’ might be at odds with the EU.²⁶ In such cases, Euroscepticism is likely to be the product of the dynamics between government and opposition.²⁷

Because of the integration-related tasks that parties perform in office and the need to endorse and campaign for compromises brokered with the EU, governing parties are generally more constrained in their ability to articulate concerns with regard to European issues than parties in opposition.

Conversely, the desire to make inroads into the competition for power and to increase policy influence in Brussels can actually encourage opposition parties to embrace Eurosceptic views or, in the aspirant countries, to criticise the government for its excessive/inadequate efforts to meet the conditionality for accession.

Indeed, while ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ Eurosceptic parties²⁸ are represented in the parliamentary arena of many member states, principled hostility towards the EU is very rare among parties in office.

Exceptions include the presence in governing alliances of parties like the Freedom Party in Austria (1999-2002), Lega Nord in Italy (1994-1996, 2001-2005, 2005-2006, 2008-2011), the Party of Freedom in the Netherlands (2010-2012²⁹), or the Peasants’ Party in Poland (2005-2007, of which between 2006-2007 in coalition with the radical Samoobrona and the deeply-conservative League of Polish Families, both anti-EU). The Conservative Party in the UK is then an altogether outlier to most known trends.

23 Taggart, Paul and Szczerbiak, Aleks (2000), “Opposing Europe: party systems and opposition to the Union, the Euro and Europeanisation”, Working Paper, No. 36, Sussex European Institute.

24 Hix, Simon (1999), The political system of the European Union, London: Macmillan, p. 162.

25 Bartolini, Stefano (1999), “Political representation in loosely bounded territories: between Europe and the nation state”, Conference Paper EUR/17, Conference “Multi-level party systems: Europeanisation and the reshaping of national political representation”, Florence: European University Institute, 12/1999, p. 44.

26 Taggart, Paul and Szczerbiak, Aleks (2002), “The party politics of Euroscepticism in EU member and candidate states”, Opposing Europe Research Network, Working Paper, No. 6, Sussex European Institute, p. 7.

27 Sitter, Nick (2001), “The politics of opposition and European integration in Scandinavia: is Euroscepticism a government- opposition dynamic?”, West European Politics, Volume 24, Number 4, pp. 22-39.

28 According to the definition of Taggart, Paul (1998), “A touchstone of dissent: Euroscepticism in contemporary Western European party systems”, European Journal of Political Research, Volume 33, Number 3, pp. 363-388, ‘soft’ entails qualified criticism of European integration either on grounds of particular national concerns or for particular policy reasons, while ‘hard’ involves the outright rejection of the EU.

29 Agreed to support but did not have any ministers in the minority government of Prime Minister Mark Rutte, which included also the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy and the Christian Democratic Appeal party.

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The same goes for the former aspirant countries of Central and Eastern Europe where Eurosceptic parties were almost invariably ‘soft’ EU antagonists and mainly so in opposition rather than government. The Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS) is essentially the only (or at least the most notorious) overtly Eurosceptic party which held office in the CEE countries during integration (1992-1994, 1994-1998, and 2006-2010). And the HZDS fell from grace exactly because of its anti-EU rhetoric and actions. In fact, the articulation of Eurosceptic sentiment or just “sitting on the fence”³⁰ did not bode well for many of the CEE ‘core’ parties during accession, which, as a result, lost power (for instance, the Hungarian Federation of Young Democrats (Fidesz) in 2002, the Romanian Social Democratic Party in 1996 or the Czech Civic Democratic Party in 1998).³¹

On the other hand, political parties on the fringes of the party system – that is, with little/no prospects of entering government, usually small and extremist (in left-right terms) – may be considerably more inclined to embrace a critical EU stance than their large and moderate counterparts. Their peripheral status means that European integration/membership is a secondary issue to them, which they cannot actually influence but can at least appropriate in order to strengthen their claim as alternatives to the political mainstream and maybe even gain some visibility in the process without fears of damaging their long-term electoral fortunes. In so doing, the politicisation of the EU becomes entangled with other facets of these parties’ ideologies, tactics and protest vocabulary. As such, opposition to ‘Europe’ serves merely as a “potential touchstone of domestic dissent” or “an appendage to a more general systemic critique”.³²

“Protest-based Euroscepticism seems to be the most pervasive type of EU party opposition”³³, taken up, for instance, by neo-fascist, agrarian, radical populist, communist, and (ultra)nationalistic parties in both Western European and CEE countries. However, the fact that parties resorting to this strategy have usually failed to secure executive power³⁴ could entail that the adoption of Eurosceptic views is the very cause of their position on the flanks of the political system.

2. But European integration/membership is not just a battlefield between insiders and outsiders in a political system. National parties also respond to the ‘European question’

under competitive pressures arising from inter-party relations.³⁵

In this line of argumentation, strategic considerations related to the search for office and/or coalition partners may prompt parties at the core as well as those at the periphery to adopt particular policies or change their EU attitudes for partisan advantage. More specifically, parties’ efforts to win votes or office is expected to compel them to formulate policies, including on ‘Europe’, that are acceptable and appealing to potential coalition partners. Whether this reflects into a toning down, abandoning or strengthening of a ‘hard’ Eurosceptic stance depends on the adversary’s strategy and success, to which political parties need to continually adjust to in multiparty systems. Here, the question is not so much if a party is indeed ‘(un)coalitionable’ (by whatever standards) but rather if the other actors – that is, domestic political parties and the EU – perceive it as such, and what the respective party is willing to do in order to boost its “coalition potential”³⁶.

30 That is, declaring a desire to join the EU while behaving in a manner which makes it impossible. According to Henderson, Karen (2001), “Euroscepticism or Europhobia: opposition attitudes to the EU in the Slovak Republic”, Opposing Europe Research Network, Working Paper, No. 5, Sussex European Institute, p. 21.

31 Lewis, Paul G. (2005), “EU enlargement and party systems in Central Europe”, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, Volume 21, Number 2, pp. 171-199.

32 Taggart (1998), op. cit., quotes from p. 372 and 384, respectively.

33 Ibid, p. 372.

34 Bielasiak, Jack (2004), “Party systems and EU accession: Euroscepticism in East Europe”, Conference on public opinion about the EU in post-communist Eastern Europe, Indiana University, p. 21.

35 Batory (2002), op. cit., p. 59 and Sitter (2002), op. cit.

36 Sartori (1976), op. cit.

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The EU acquis or conditionality for accession does not explicitly refer to political parties. However, the EU’s principles of democracy and respect for the rule of law, human rights and minorities included in Article 6 of the Treaty on the European Union for the member states and in the Copenhagen criteria for the aspirant countries can be interpreted as being incompatible with the participation of extremist parties in government. This was seen, for example, in the decision of the EU to freeze in 2000 bilateral political contacts with Austria in response to the inclusion in government of Jörg Haider’s Freedom Party or to deny in 1997 candidate status to Slovakia due to the presence in office of Vladimír Mečiar’s HZDS.³⁷

Anticipated disapproval from the EU, and fears that this could delay the goal of membership, had an impact on coalition-building also in other CEE countries by making some otherwise ‘useful’ parties (to the purpose of building government majorities) off-limits. These include, for instance, the Justice Party in Hungary, the Self-Defence Party in Poland and the Greater Romania Party in Romania. It also persuaded parties like the Hungarian Independent Smallholders’ Party (FKGP), at the margins of its system, to shift its position on the EU before the 1998 elections by moderating its Eurosceptic instincts so as to gain the trust and partnership of Fidesz.³⁸ And the reverse also seems to be true given that the FKGP’s drift back towards the fringes of the party system after its time in office with Fidesz was accompanied by a re-strengthening of the party’s Eurosceptic discourse (which drove both allies and voters away from it at the 2002 Hungarian elections). Clearly, not all such attempts to pull off a pro-EU transformation can be successful: for example, the EU remained incredulous to the last-minute change of heart on ‘Europe’ espoused either by the Greater Romania Party in 2000 or the Hungarian Justice Party in 2002, both of which continued to be side-lined also by their national political colleagues.

3. While parties’ EU attitudes might be mitigated by proximity to power and inter-party relations, they do not seem to be a function of strategic choices meant to reflect or attract the European views of electorates.

This builds on two assumptions. First, that in democratic electoral competition, public opinion matters for political parties. Not that parties would be “empty vessels into which issue positions are poured in response to electoral or constituency pressures.”³⁹ People often take clues from their political parties, especially if they need to substitute their unawareness on matters put up for decision (like those related to the European Union). However, in trying to gain their support and then represent and act on behalf of voters, political parties cannot just lead but must also follow/accommodate people’s interests and preferences.

Second, it assumes that the public holds well-developed views on foreign policy, including EU integration/membership. Studies reveal that people’s European attitudes are associated with variables like age, education and income levels, in the sense that younger, more educated and wealthier people are inclined towards positive EU stances.⁴⁰ Moreover, in the CEE context, it was found that people’s feelings towards regime change, by extrapolating from past to present conditions and to what the future may bring, strongly influence their views on ‘Europe’.⁴¹ For instance, the better the domestic

37 Field, Heather (2001), “Awkward states: EU enlargement in Slovakia, Croatia, and Serbia”, Perspectives on European Politics and Society, Volume 1, Number 1, pp. 123-146.

38 Batory (2002), op. cit., pp. 211-216.

39 Marks, Gary and and Wilson, Carole J. (2000), “The past in the present: a cleavage theory of party response to European integration”, British Journal of Political Science, Volume 30, Number 3, pp. 433-459, quote from p. 434.

40 Gabel, Matthew J. and Palmer, Harvey D. (1995), “Understanding variation in public support for European integration”, European Journal of Political Research, Volume 27, Number 1, pp. 3-19.

41 See, for instance, Evans, Geoffrey and Whitefield, Stephen (1993), “Identifying the bases of party competition in Eastern Europe”, British Journal of Political Science, Number 23, pp. 531-532; Mishler, William and Rose, Richard (1998),

EU integration and party politics in the Balkans E P C I S S U E P A P E R N